Hornady Seating / Crimp die problems 45 acp

I only have a few years of reloading experience, (308) and am getting into .45 auto reloads now. Using a single stage (co-ax) - and some hornady dies. resizing / expanding/ seating all seem to go well, but i can't get a proper crimp - I've watched a few videos and read and reread the instructions, - sometimes it works and sometimes it docent, My jar of bullets to pull keeps getting bigger. anybody else have problems with seater / crimper coho dies? I'm just about to order a redding taper crimp die and call it a 4 stage process . from what I've dug up sounds like a reasonable approach.

I personally prefer to seat and crimp separately for semi autos, I just seem to get better results that way although I know many will say it's not necessary, just my preference. Are you not getting a consistent crimp?

You have a three die set? prolly.
You don't crimp .45acp anyway.. you just iron out the flare.. if you flared it.
If you didn't flare it (a lot of people don't with jacketed slugs), it should be good right there.

ya 3 die set, i did flare out just a little,... i might try a few not flaring.

i don't seem to be getting a consistent crimp, even though OAL stays within .01 or so some chamber and some do not, they get stuck/ encounter resistance so they don't fall in easy. about 1/2 way. - they were full length resized.

ya 3 die set, i did flare out just a little,... i might try a few not flaring.

i don't seem to be getting a consistent crimp, even though OAL stays within .01 or so some chamber and some do not, they get stuck/ encounter resistance so they don't fall in easy. about 1/2 way. - they were full length resized.

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What's the diameter of your bullets? You should measure them. It sounds like they're too fat for your chamber.

Cast or jacketed bullets? I load almost exclusively lead so I flare more than most with no issues. Have you tried adding a little more crimp? I'm not on the no crimp team, I will pull a bullet though and make sure I'm not swaging the bullet smaller.

some fit great,cycle, but i did notice last night when i was cycling dummys - that the action would sink the bullet another .01 or .02 in to the case. from either the ramp or the slide not sure. but they were shrinking , so i thought i didn't have enough crimp.... but when i tried to put more crimp on, they would bulge the brass a little close to the lip of the case. or completely destroy it. so today i messed round with it a bunch, thought i had it, but then same problems came up again.

The crimp is probably your problem. It's common that crimping will essentially "buckle" the area just below the crimp proper. Again, you don't actually crimp .45acp. The less you flare the case, the more the case will grip the bullet. Maximum grip is realized with no flaring.

You must have already checked but, have you measured to make sure all your bullets are at .451? I'm measuring my rounds at the top of the brass and getting a solid 0.4715, on rounds loaded a year ago and rounds loaded in the last six months in mixed brass with Rainier Ballistics plated 200g HPs, with RCBS and Lyman on the newer rounds.

Could be a bad box of HSM? I got a bad box of Rainier once. The plating had fractures in it. They replaced them with no issues.

I messed around with the same type of issue and finally got a taper crimp die. I backed the bullet seat crimp out and just seat the bullet, then taper crimp Works great now and no issues in thousands of rounds.

Have you been checking the length of your cases? Inconsistencies in crimp could be directly related to varying case lengths. I know my mixed brass is all over the place. I'd try sorting by length, setting the crimp for that length and seeing if it's any more consistent for those rounds. Not sure what a new die would do for you since it's the same principle unless the die is borked.

i actually trimmed this batch of cases (i know that some people do not trim handgun cases until they are over length) but since it was my first batch, i wanted to try to make em uniform, so yes they were all trimmed to .888 +/- .005

Roll crimps work well for bullets with cannelures, but not so well on those without them sometimes.
I'd suggest a taper crimp, and for a .45 ACP, you might even try using a .308 Win die, or another die that has a taper to it that your case that has a bullet seated in it will start into the taper.
Probably best to just buy one.
Funny thing about .45 ACP brass, they can actually get shorter with firing.
Several forums discuss this, just search for: ".45 ACP cases get shorter when fired."

Edit: Sorry elsie, I was typing when you posted. We both agree, though...

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